THE DESTRUCTIVE RIPPLES OF DRUG USE

On many levels, John Reilly Schultz is a sick man. He even said so
himself.

Unlike many of the people who turn to using or selling drugs because
they see it as a way of escaping neglected, impoverished communities
that are short on jobs and long on despair, Schultz didn't have that
hurdle.

He's a developer. He has a respected family name. He has children. And
he has a $500,000 home in Ortega.

Yet while those advantages weren't enough to stop him from pursuing a
crack cocaine habit, what happened last October should not have taken
place.

That was when Schultz, now 47, was awaiting a delivery of crack
cocaine in a drug house off Blanding Boulevard.

Then, according to the Times-Union, the dealers his supplier had
visited started shooting at each other. Caught in the gunfire was
Analiza Gobaton, a nurse who was on her way to an awards program at
her children's school.

Gobaton, 41, died two days later. Now her husband, John, wants Schultz
and others who were in the drug house that day to be held
accountable.

Schultz, however, told the Times-Union that he wasn't responsible for
her death because he didn't fire a gun. But if he was truly a sick guy
trying to get well, he'd acknowledge that his drug habit, a habit that
fueled the shootout that killed Gobaton, as well as the drug habits of
countless other users, is contributing to the deaths of people and
communities everywhere.

In Mexico, which is the United States' third-largest trading partner
and our nearest southern neighbor, more than 34,612 people are
estimated to have been killed by drug-related violence since 2006.
Most of that violence has been generated by warring drug cartels.

The U.S. State Department says as much as 90 percent of all cocaine
sold here comes through Mexico. Sales are estimated to top $60 billion
annually.

But one doesn't have to look to Mexico to see the devastation that
drug use - and the ensuing drug war - has inflicted on people's lives.

Right here in Jacksonville there are places like Eureka Gardens, as
well as other older communities, where the drug trade has filled the
economic void. It's a predicament that has led many young, mostly
black men to start selling drugs to make money, and the violence that
comes along with it has forced many residents to behave like
prisoners, instead of citizens, in their own neighborhoods.

Kids grow up learning their ABCs along with how to scramble beneath a
bed at the sounds of gunfire, and mothers are forced to have to raise
their children in fear.

Sometimes, people like Gobaton wind up getting killed in the
crossfire, while in the meantime, drug users like Schultz can just
escape back to Ortega, or some grand gated place, while shrugging off
their role in keeping drug and crime-filled neighborhoods mired in
despair.

"Yes, the drug dealers are responsible for shooting people," Marc
Mauer, director of The Sentencing Project, a research and advocacy
organization that fights for fairer drug and sentencing laws, told me.
"But there's a real demand chain that contributes to this."

Mauer stopped short of saying that Schultz should face murder charges
for Gobaton's slaying. While it's clear that Schultz had chances to
clear up his habit, I still believe that prison should be for those
who actually do the killing.

But instead of insisting that he isn't responsible for Gobaton's death
- - a death that left a husband without a wife and three children
without a mother - that tragedy ought to at least force Schultz to
acknowledge that his sickness destroys more lives than his own.

And I hope that one day soon, that acknowledgement might be part of
what motivates him to finally get well.